Dear Editor,
GuySuCo: what to do about it? What is the best way, the least painless way, to proceed? Clinical and dispassionate sounds official and reassuring, except that no one wants to be the one to step forward, measure the vitals, and pronounce. From any angle viewed, any pragmatic decision seems to lead invariably to a lose-lose situation. What is it that can be salvaged, extricated, and redirected, if only to breathe some hope and continuity into the lives of those most impacted?
GuySuCo: this is a terrible Grecian tragedy unfolding before the eyes of a torn nation right here in Guyana. It has most things that are distressingly negative, and part of a haunting chorus: there is the financial, the racial, the social, and the political. There are some other components left unmentioned. To restate the obvious even some more, anything the government does (or doesn’t do) brings ‘baad feelins’ to itself, while transfusing real hard feelings to those on the sharp bitter end of the stick.
There are some 10,000 families, a major ethnic and political constituency, representative of 49% of those who exercised the franchise and firmly affixed to resentful smarting opposition. And there is a product that cannot compete and a dollar drain that cannot be maintained. Those who claim to have the workers’ welfare at heart know all of this. They also know that the government is locked in a half-nelson, if not a full one. Move and succumb; stay still and suffocate slowly.
This country cannot afford tens of billions annually on a losing proposition; the families cannot afford the loss of income and possible existence; and society cannot afford the sure-to-follow agonizing cleavage that lurks powerfully. The opposition knows this; the government knows this too. It is fiscal management capsized, with ruptures expanded and sown with salt, while watered with acid.
So what to do? Is there a way out? Can this sacred cow (no blasphemy intended) be made secular, or even into a productive workhorse? For certainty, anything whispered in recommendation will attract advocates in bulk, and adversaries in disturbed multitudes. Still, some commonsense should prevail, at the risk that even that will be found vulgar. Let’s start.
In the beginning, the word was breadbasket. To elaborate, it was that Guyana could be the breadbasket of the region. Unfortunately, this country is still stuck at the beginning, and all that is encompassed by that lofty word: remember, breadbasket. The refrain is always frozen at potential; that which is realizable, could happen. Well today there is GuySuCo and all of its calamities. Breadbasket and potential and opportunities could be one of the ways out. Maybe, it is the only way out.
There already should have been heavy studies on possible conversion options, and how to go about them. Is it rice, coconut, or some new and comprehensive combination of crops on a scale never contemplated for commercial profit? Is this viable given the soil and the calibre of tillers? Is there the requisite demand? And if there is, can Guyana (GuySuCo) reinvent and reposition itself to supply accordingly? Can financing and guidance be squeezed out of possible partners? There ought to be pondered a whole system of subsidies, loans, and micro-financing for projects involving specific commodities at a serious level. Or should it be diversification or divestiture (sophisticated words encapsulating a world of untold misery)? If the latter, should this be slow and in piecemeal increments? Now for the showstopper: Can the opposition be worked with and encouraged to the table of consensus?
If critical support and different forms of power-sharing structures could have been floated, tabled, and discussed in earnest and in secret talks, then why not now where there is the urgency of a grave national issue? It is one that should be less about individual or party power and aspirations, and more about people priorities. Why not leverage (barter) some of the developing oil story to infuse the dying sugar story?
Stated in a less nuanced manner, the opposition has to have something to sell to its base, and to reassure that it has not sold them out. As the financial haemorrhage continues unchecked, pieces of the action must incorporate an extended hand, as well as an encircling arm. Reports are that the Americans seek such movement and engagement. Still, in the stormy context that has always been Guyana, the opposition is all too aware of what it has in hand: a bargaining chip, a pocket nuclear option, and a reservoir overflowing with heaving emotions. Even if it loses, it still wins.
Editor, this much has to be faced head-on: the financial dilemma can only be solved by the politicos; the social spill managed by the politicos; and the agricultural vision (or any other) pursued by the politicos. This is too sensitive, too ugly, too painful, and too divisive to be left unattended or addressed unilaterally. Using a figure of a twenty billion bailout (subsidy) annually and twenty thousand workers (somewhat inflated), that amounts to a per worker figure of one million a year. Surely that same money can be utilized to get more than is returned today, and that is promised for the foreseeable future. And that offers each worker some longevity.
This is how and when and where political leaders earn their money, earn their place, and earn the confidence of the involved and the interested.
The solutions do not reside in non-decisions, or stalling, or hesitancy, or fear. It calls for tremendous insights, and then the political courage and creativity to journey to the arduous turbulent end. And it will be such a journey.
Yours faithfully,
GHK Lall
